Ulysses S. Grant
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| Ulysses S. Grant | |
|---|---|
| Personal | |
| Date & Place of Birth | April 27, 1822, Point Pleasant, Ohio |
| Parents | Jesse Root Grant Hannah Simpson Grant |
| Religion | Methodist |
| Spouse | Julia Boggs Dent Grant (1826–1902) |
| Children | Jesse Grant Ulysses S. Grant, Jr. Nellie Grant Frederick Grant |
| Date & Place of Death | July 23, 1885, Mount McGregor, New York |
| Place of Burial | Grant's Tomb, Riverside Park, New York City, NY |
| Military | |
| Education | United States Military Academy West Point, New York |
| Branch of Service | United States Army |
| Years of Service | 1839-1854, 1861-1869 |
| Highest rank awarded | Lieutenant General (wartime) General of the Armies |
| Commands held | 21st Illinois Infantry Regiment Army of the Tennessee Military Division of the Mississippi Armies of the United States |
| Battles participated in | Fort Donelson Shiloh Vicksburg Chattanooga Overland Campaign Siege of Petersburg Appomattox Campaign |
| Post-war career | 18th President of the United States March 4, 1869 - March 4, 1877 Grant & Ward (investment firm) Author |
Overview
Ulysses S. Grant,[1] born Hiram Ulysses Grant (April 27, 1822 – July 23, 1885), was an American general and the 18th President of the United States (1869–1877). He achieved international fame as the leading Union general in the American Civil War.
Grant first reached national prominence by taking Forts Henry and Donelson in 1862 in the first Union victories of the war. The following year, his celebrated campaign ending in the surrender of Vicksburg secured Union control of the Mississippi and—with the simultaneous Union victory at Gettysburg—turned the tide of the war in the North's favor. Named commanding general of the Federal armies in 1864, he implemented a coordinated strategy of simultaneous attacks aimed at destroying the South's ability to carry on the war. In 1865, after conducting a costly war of attrition in the East, he accepted the surrender of his Confederate opponent Robert E. Lee at Appomattox Court House. Grant has been described by J.F.C. Fuller as "the greatest general of his age and one of the greatest strategists of any age." His Vicksburg Campaign in particular has been scrutinized by military specialists around the world.
In 1868, Grant was elected president as a Republican. Grant was the first president to serve for two full terms since Andrew Jackson forty years before. He led Radical Reconstruction and built a powerful patronage-based Republican party in the South, with the adroit use of the army. He took a hard line that reduced violence by groups like the Ku Klux Klan.
Presidential experts typically rank Grant in the lowest quartile of U.S. presidents, primarily for his tolerance of corruption. In recent years, however, his reputation as president has improved somewhat among scholars impressed by his support for civil rights for African Americans.[2] Unsuccessful in winning the nomination for a third term in 1880, bankrupted by bad investments, and terminally ill with throat cancer, Grant wrote his Memoirs, which were enormously successful among veterans, the public, and the critics.
References
- ↑ See Ulysses S. Grant - Military Career & Time Between Wars for a discussion of Grant's middle initial.
- ↑ See Skidmore (2005); Bunting (2004), Scaturro (1998), Smith (2001) and Simpson (1998)
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